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Ale's Stones (Ales stenar in Swedish) is a megalithic monument in Scania
Skåne

Scania is a geographical region on the southernmost tip of the Scandinavian peninsula, a traditional provinces of Sweden in the Kingdom of Sweden, before 1658 a province in the Kingdom of Denmark and part of the historical lands of Denmark....
 in southern Sweden
Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic countries on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden has land borders with Norway to the west and Finland to the northeast, and it is connected to Denmark by the ?resund Bridge in the south....
, probably from circa 600 CE, that is, the end of the Nordic Iron Age
Iron Age

In archaeology, the Iron Age was the stage in the development of any people in which tools and weapons whose main ingredient was iron were prominent....
. Scanian folklore
Folklore

Folklore is the body of expressive culture, including tales, music, dance, legends, oral history, proverbs, jokes, superstitions, customs, and so forth within a particular population comprising the traditions of that culture, subculture, or group ....
 ascribes the stones to King Ale
Ale the Strong

In Scandinavian legend, Ale the Strong belonged to the House of Skj?ldung , and he was the son of king Fridleif of Denmark and a cousin of Helgi's ....
's grave. This site is significant for Scandinavian heritage studies.

Ale's Stones consist of a 67 metre long stone ship
Stone ship

The Stone ship was a Germanic burial custom, typical of Scandinavia, built from tightly or loosely fit slabs or stones. Sometimes they are of monumental proportions....
 formed by 59 large boulders of sandstone
Sandstone

Sandstone is a sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-size mineral or rock Particle size . Most sandstone is composed of quartz and/or feldspar because these are the most common minerals in the Earth's crust ....
, weighing up to 1.8 tonne
Tonne

A tonne or metric ton , also referred to as a metric tonne, is a measurement of mass equal to 1,000 kilograms, or 2204.6226 pounds....
s each.

989, during the first archaeological excavations performed to scientifically investigate and date the formation, archaeologists found a decorated clay pot with burned human bones inside the ship setting.






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Ales Stenar Bred
Ale's Stones (Ales stenar in Swedish) is a megalithic monument in Scania
Skåne

Scania is a geographical region on the southernmost tip of the Scandinavian peninsula, a traditional provinces of Sweden in the Kingdom of Sweden, before 1658 a province in the Kingdom of Denmark and part of the historical lands of Denmark....
 in southern Sweden
Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic countries on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden has land borders with Norway to the west and Finland to the northeast, and it is connected to Denmark by the ?resund Bridge in the south....
, probably from circa 600 CE, that is, the end of the Nordic Iron Age
Iron Age

In archaeology, the Iron Age was the stage in the development of any people in which tools and weapons whose main ingredient was iron were prominent....
. Scanian folklore
Folklore

Folklore is the body of expressive culture, including tales, music, dance, legends, oral history, proverbs, jokes, superstitions, customs, and so forth within a particular population comprising the traditions of that culture, subculture, or group ....
 ascribes the stones to King Ale
Ale the Strong

In Scandinavian legend, Ale the Strong belonged to the House of Skj?ldung , and he was the son of king Fridleif of Denmark and a cousin of Helgi's ....
's grave. This site is significant for Scandinavian heritage studies.

Ale's Stones consist of a 67 metre long stone ship
Stone ship

The Stone ship was a Germanic burial custom, typical of Scandinavia, built from tightly or loosely fit slabs or stones. Sometimes they are of monumental proportions....
 formed by 59 large boulders of sandstone
Sandstone

Sandstone is a sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-size mineral or rock Particle size . Most sandstone is composed of quartz and/or feldspar because these are the most common minerals in the Earth's crust ....
, weighing up to 1.8 tonne
Tonne

A tonne or metric ton , also referred to as a metric tonne, is a measurement of mass equal to 1,000 kilograms, or 2204.6226 pounds....
s each.

Excavations

In 1989, during the first archaeological excavations performed to scientifically investigate and date the formation, archaeologists found a decorated clay pot with burned human bones inside the ship setting. The bones are considered to be from a pyre and are thought to have been placed in the pot at a later date. The pot's content varied in age; some material was from 330-540 CE, while a piece of charred food crust also found inside was determined to be from 540-650 CE. The archaeologists working on the project also found birch charcoal remains from 540-650 CE underneath an undisturbed boulder. According to the National Heritage Board (Sweden) (RAÄ), Carbon-14
Carbon-14

Carbon-14, 14C, or radiocarbon, is a radioactive isotope of carbon discovered on February 27, 1940, by Martin Kamen and Sam Ruben at the University of California Radiation Laboratory in Berkeley, California, though its existence had been suggested already in 1934 by Franz Kurie....
 dating of the organic material from the site indicates that six of the samples are from around 600 CE, while one sample is from ca. 3500 BCE. The diverging sample came from soot-covered stones that are believed to be the remnants of an older hearth, found close to the ship setting. On the basis of these results, the Swedish National Heritage Board has set a suggested date of creation for Ale's Stones to 1,400 BP
Before Present

Before Present years are a time scale used in archaeology, geology, and other science disciplines to specify when events in the past occurred. Because the "present" time changes, standard practice is to use 1950 Common_Era as the arbitrary origin of the age scale....
, i.e. 600 CE.

In 2006, the technical unit (UV Teknik) of the Archaeological Excavation Department (UV) of the National Heritage Board conducted georadar and magnetometer
Magnetometer

A magnetometer is a scientific instrument used to measure the strength and/or direction of the magnetic field in the vicinity of the instrument....
 measurements in and around the site. Publication of the prospection results is planned for late 2007 or early 2008.

Speculations

Like many other megalithic monuments, speculations have been made about the significance of Ale's Stones. One of those attributed to Ale's Stones is that the structure had an astronomical
Astronomy

Astronomy is the science of Astronomical object and Phenomenon that originate outside the Earth's atmosphere . It is concerned with the evolution, physics, chemistry, meteorology, and motion of celestial objects, as well as the physical cosmology....
 and/or astrological purpose, based on the controversial interpretation that the stones have been positioned according to the 365 days of the year and the 24 hours of the day. Bob G. Lind is the main proponent of this theory, which is considered to be pseudoscience
Pseudoscience

Pseudoscience is any knowledge, methodology, belief, or practice that is claimed to be scientific, or that is made to appear to be scientific, but which does not adhere to the scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, or otherwise lacks scientific status....
 by established scholars. Professional astronomers and archaeologists believe that this is a cremation grave dating from ca. 500 CE
Common Era

Common Era, abbreviated as CE, is a designation for the calendar system most commonly used in the Western world, and also internationally, for numbering the year part of the calendar date....
.

See also




External links in Swedish

  • , published Nov. 2006 (in Swedish).


External links in English

  • about the archeological excavations at Ale's Stones
  • , published 2007 (in English)